YOU are the Gospel!

In order to be a good “evangelizer” or proponent of the Gospel, you must live it

Bishop Edward B. Scharfenberger

Before anyone decides to report me to the pope for blatant and blasphemous heresy, hear me out. In my parish days back in Brooklyn, I would over remind my good “front office” folks the importance of their every word and gesture, even their body language. Rightly or wrongly, people make judgments on their first impressions of the person they are encountering. So, to bring the point home, I would tell them: “You are the pope!”

At the risk of stating the obvious, people of faith, who are known to be working for or affiliated with a church or religious institution, are held to at least as high a standard of any business organization. I do not want to engage right now in the argument that “the Church is not a business!” Of course, it is and must be more than a firm or corporation formed for the purpose of making a profit or seeking a product. Yet in a real way we ARE trying to promote a way of life, or better, a personal savior who promises a happy and humanly fulfilling way of life, indeed salvation itself. We are, if you will, “selling” the Gospel, the good news that God loves us and wants all of us to have the gift of eternal life, beginning right now. This is a big deal. We are not just offering some kind of exercise routine, diet or elixir to help someone “get in shape” or “feel good,” but the very end and meaning of human life as more than just a momentary rush, a gold medal or even a billion-dollar fortune. We believe in and live for so much more in our mission of evangelization, or “gospel-ing.”

Now many people — more than we might readily admit — decide to come with us or move on because of a single encounter with a person whom, at least in their mind, is believed to represent the entire faith. How many sad stories I have heard over the years of a bad experience in a confessional or even a phone call or a perceived lack of courtesy at the front office of a rectory or in a church vestibule. On the other hand, I know of lifelong friendships and even a path toward deep spiritual growth began with a response of “I’ll be right over” when a parishioner calls for a pastoral visit to an ailing spouse or parent. 

I have been known to tease a congregation sometimes by posing the question at the start of a homily, “Are you good news or bad news?” It’s just a way of inviting us all to think about how well we represent — just by our personal presence or habitual attitudes — the joy that the Gospel of Jesus Christ really brings. In order to do this, of course, we must be personally full of that confidence that we are loved beyond all boundaries by a God who loves us so much that we would have sent his Son to die for us if we were the only person in the world. Yet that is exactly what the Cross portrays: a God who dies for us. It is the supreme act of love that even people without a religious faith are moved by, that there is no greater act of love than to die for another person.

So to say YOU are the Gospel is not so far off the mark as it may seem. Indeed, following the Eucharistic Revival, recently celebrated in Indianapolis, the bishops of the United States are calling upon every single Catholic to evangelize at least ONE person in the coming year. Is that too much or too difficult to ask? Are they simply sloughing off their own responsibility to preach and teach the Gospel by trying to guilt others into doing their job? Unless I am completely misreading the message Jesus left us, it is that all of us are called to spread the Gospel to the ends of the earth. This is what is called the “Great Commission” and it can be found explicitly in the Gospel of St. Matthew, chapter 28, verses 16-20. Yes, it tells the eleven in Galilee to go into the world and make disciples of all nations, beginning with baptism, but how else can this mission be fulfilled if it is not passed on from person to person?

I don’t think I need to belabor the point. The truth is that whether a person is or is not alive with the faith and the joy of the Gospel most probably has at least something to do with someone else who is, someone whose words, gestures and attitudes inspired them to “come and see,” as Jesus would say to those who were moved by his words and actions. 

In order to be a good “evangelizer” or proponent of the Gospel, it is not necessary to have memorized the Catechism or to be able to quote the scriptures, chapter and verse. I have personally seen many people do this, even to me as a priest. While at times it is good to be reminded of a teaching of our faith that may have been practiced as seriously as it should be, the decisive element in conversion to the truth of the Gospel is most often not in reciting it but by living it.

We have all heard the observation that the trouble with the Christian Gospel is not that it has been tried and found wanting, but that it has been heard but not heeded or, as G.K. Chesterton said, it has been found difficult and left untried. Immediately, we could all think of specific demands of Jesus Christ — without even asking a priest or consulting the Bible — that we know he said and no doubt have struggled with or questioned personally. Need I quote them here? His sayings about forgiving and the exercise of patience and charity are almost universally known. But how are they seen in practice in our everyday lives? Aye, that’s the rub, as Hamlet might say. 

An act of forgiveness or an extension of unexpected kindness or even material generosity might well be the first gesture that leads another person in our life to Gospel conversion, especially if unexpected. If you ever read or saw a version of “Les Miserables,” the powerful scene of the conversion of Jean Valjean poignantly conveys such a moment. Valjean, desperate to feed a child in his care, actually does steal some silverware from a kindly priest who offers him hospitality, only to be apprehended by a constable and forced to return the items. Taking pity on him, the priest gives him even more — some valuable candlesticks — saying, “You forget I gave these also, would you leave the best behind?” In that moment, the priest WAS the Gospel. How may we respond to such moments as well?

 @AlbanyDiocese